Any Australians?

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Its so easy to rip off American Businessmen! Its how countrys worldwide make money!!

Which will be why the USA is the worlds strongest economy :stuck_out_tongue_winking_eye:

you sure about that ?I thought canada had nearly caught up to us and I know several countrys have a stronger dollar then us. Not to mention current politcal bullshit and unemployment rates and the piss porr wages they are offering for the jobs that do exist, Im no so certain that the US has the strongest any more.

I still dont get it how they have the strongest economy but out of the first world countries its the poorest! You took math before, so you must have dont exchange rates and such, or the statstic thing with the pie chart and such? Yea. 1 pound is like 2.19 cnd dollards.... that is kinda sad.

Canada has nowhere near caught up with you. Germany is number two.The streangth of ones economy is not determined by the value of ones currency (Britain has always had a stronger currency than you, but thats nots to say we have a stronger economy than you by a long-shot). Nor are unemployments rates a determining factor, for example the British economy grew strong in the 1980's, yet had one of the higehst rates of unemployment in post-war history.The USA is still deffinately the strongest economic power. Your produce more, consume more, employ more, expand your business over seas. Thats economic streantgh.

well I know canada has made great strides in it, motor companys moved alot of plants there years ago to keep costs down and keep profits bigger. now they are ookig at moving those plants elsewhere because the canadien dollar has made so much progress in reaching the same as the US that its not so cost effective anymore, its not much cheaper now then to have it here at home in the USA.I guess this means my ford will now be made in mexico

Who are these people that you are hearing all this stuff from? Terrorism is so uncommon in the past decade. The Omagh Bombing in 1998 was the last large scale attack and it created such opposition to the IRA that they had to rethink their tactics. Everything is mostly political now, with the IRA's political body Sinn Féin being in the news a lot more. The last IRA business I heard was a little over a month ago when they killed the British Spy Denis Donaldson.And Strapping, religion barely has anything to do with the troubles anymore. People say that they're fighting cause of it but its just an excuse now!

In reply to: And Strapping, religion barely has anything to do with the troubles anymore. People say that they're fighting cause of it but its just an excuse now! Religeon is still a factor. Mostly its plain old nationalism (Irish nationalism versus British nationalism), but ones faith is the easiest way to indentify which of those nationalities is by your religeon. And there is genuine hatred between the religeous groups among many of those that are willing to fight. Dare I say i have spoke to full blown orangists who are unashamed of their belief that violence is neccesary. One guy I've met claims to be a member of The Orange Volenteers (off shoot of the UDA) and has some interesting photos to back it up. He hates catholics, hes happy to tell people so. I dont support these people btw (beyond sympathising with the pro-union stand point). The extent to which plain old criminalism is a factor shouldnt be over looked, by nationalism and sectarianism is still how these people recruit. Of course its importnat to add that they dont recruit aswell nowadays. Like you say most people are tired of fighting for the moment.

My dad went for a pint in Sinn Féin headquaters the other day. He was doing a printing job for a friend of his and he was invited out. When my mum found out she nearly took his head off!Oh and I forgot to mention, the last riot wasn't last year, it was just in late February this year. I remember it well cause I was just about 20 metres away from the front line. I wasn't involved in it or anything, myself and my gf were in Dublin booking our holiday and when we came out of the travel agent's a riot van almost knocked us down.

I am not surprised. Afterall Sinn Fein is actualy banned in the Republic isnt it? So I was told once. Its kind of ironic seeing as we havnt banned them in this country, despite eveyrthing. My dad would likewise be pretty pissed if he found out how many hardcore unionists I talk to, considering he went to Ulster to stop those kinds of people. I dont support violence though.Ah okay well, February feels like it could be last year, I knew the last Dublin riot was recent. I was surprised when I heard about it, i didnt realise before that there were many in the Republic who were willing to be violent over the whole issue, I didnt realise you had enough protestants or unionists to do anything worth notice.

Oh my mistake Sinn Fein actualy has seats in your partliament.

Well see the thing about it was that the Unionists that were there all came down from the North. They were the families of people who were killed in IRA attacks, it was the Love Ulster Parade. The Republicans that opposed them were a mixture between real IRA members and supporters, and a large group of young shitheads who think they're cool and just used it as an excuse to destroy things.

Oh why the hell would a bunch of Ulstermen Protestants go to Dublin for a parade? The guinness factory? My ass. Thats so dumb. And as for those that opposed them, well how on earth did they benefit Ireland. There was an Irish parade here in Leeds the other month (we got a sizable Irish Catholic community, they grew up in a few large UK cities during hte 50's). I must confess it pissed me off to see Green&Golds flying in my British city, but its not like I started throwing bricks.

The other month? Ya mean on Paddy's Day? Well there are a large group of Irish living in the UK. There are only 5 million people living in Éire, but there was a recent survey done and they found that there are over 80 million Irish people spread all over the world.They came down to show that they weren't afraid of us or something. Pretty silly since there are no troubles down here with any of that stuff. Especially when it comes to religion. The is no sectarian violence in the Republic, except for with the increase in illegal refugees into the country, but that is more racial really.

No the parade was before paddies day, a whole month before I believe.

I think alot of Americans think they are Irish but arent. If there are 80 million Irish abroud there must be 300 million Britishers.

Well it was celebrated in Britain a week before anywhere else in the world, to the best of my knowledge atleast. My sister went over to London for the Six Nations final game between Ireland and England which was on Paddy's Day Weekend (what a game!) and nobody was celebrating cause they had all done so the week before.

It deffinately wasnt St Patricks day, it was for cancer I believe.

I think when they did the survey they set the requirements for being within a certain amount of generations of a home-grown Irish person.

Well, Ireland is the cure for cancer, didn't you know? The only place that gets cancer patients is the closest part of Ireland to Sellafield.

How strong the dollar is doesn't really convey how strong economically a country is. GDP (gross domestic product) per capita, or PPP (purchasing power parity) are the best methods of comparing.Currently in the OECD (which is basically most western nations and other industrialised ones) Luxembourg is first (they cheat with lots of labour from across the boarder though), the US is second and IRELAND, yes Ireland is third. Kicking the ass of Britain languishing down in 18th or 19th.